Consumers have shown a strong desire for selecting personal images for printing. Consumers desire to print only images that they find good or valuable. One method of providing consumers with this capability is to post personal images on the internet. The photofinisher will process and scan film provided by the consumer and then post the scans at some resolution high enough to enable selecting desired photos. This allows the consumer to select images via his home computer or an interactive kiosk. However, consumers also exhibit an aversion to posting personal images on the web, even with the use of passwords and other methods of keeping the images secure, and thus are reluctant to use these internet services. Additionally, consumers prefer to receive a tangible manifestation of their images, and the images posted on the web appear all too ethereal for many consumers.
Those consumers that use digital cameras also face a problem when attempting to get high quality prints. If their local home printer is not adequate for printing the quality of prints the consumer desires, or is difficult to use, the consumer has to upload images to a service provider for printing. In this case, the consumer is forced to upload images of adequate resolution for high quality printing. This is typically a problem for consumers with low bandwidth connections. It is also a process that is fraught with difficulties associated with transferring large amounts of data. Last, digital camera users are also often uneasy with sending their image files into the “ether” as represented by the internet.
One solution to the aforementioned was described in U.S. Pat. No. Re. 36,535, entitled, “METHOD OF PRODUCING PHOTOGRAPHIC PRINTS,” issued on Jan. 25, 2000 to Hicks. Hicks disclosed two workstations, i.e., computers, one at the photo lab, the second computer at the photographer's studio. At the second computer a consumer is able to view a video image of her captured film frames, stored on a diskette, along with proof prints. An initial set of corrections are made to the film frames at the photo lab, before sending the film images and proof prints to the consumer.
FIG. 1 illustrates Hicks system. A photo lab 12 receives exposed film of subject 14, taken with camera 16. At the photo lab 12, a developer 18, an editor 20, and an analyzer 22 process the exposed film and perform the initial corrections on the film. The initial corrections are stored in a database 28 and on a diskette 30. Each frame of the film is also marked. One can display the image of each frame upon a monitor 22a, and adjust color and density during the initial corrections.
The edited and analyzed film is transferred to a proof printer 24. The proof printer 24 also uses information from the database 28 and the diskette 30 to produce proof prints that correspond to each frame of the film. A final printer 26 makes the final print upon acceptance by the consumer of the proof prints.
Before giving their acceptance, the consumer views the video image stored on the diskette 30 on a studio computer monitor 32a, upon placing the diskette 30 in studio computer 32. A video image display information box 34a will indicate such initial corrections as cropping, and also batch number and frame number of the film. A printer 34 allows printing of images from the diskette 30. The images are displayed on the studio computer monitor 32a at the photographic studio 10. At this juncture the printed images from the photographic studio 10 merely serve as a receipt to show the characteristics of the prints that have been ordered. The diskette 30 has to be returned to the photo lab 12 in order to process a final high resolution print.
The Hicks system requires that proof prints be sent along with the video image file on the diskette 30 to enable a consumer to view example high resolution proofs. Thus, the modified or corrected video image file does not contain high resolution images. In addition, extensive film management is needed in the Hicks system in order to provide a final print output. Also, the video image file is not stored at the photofinisher's, but instead has to be conveyed from the consumer to the photofinisher via a modem or other means.
What is needed is a consumer-oriented photo selection system for correcting high resolution images and sending those corrections to a photofinisher without actually sending data-intensive image files.